what is up dude. are you considering angle of attack compared to the sun while flying and establishing a route based on that? it also looked sort of gloomy out there.
Honestly it always makes me feel normal and human when I see people make the same kinds of mistakes on projects that I know I would make. “Did you put the very sensitive gps right next to the powerful spinning electromagnet” definitely sounds like something I would do without even realizing.
Yeah well, you can try and think of any conceivable problem in your lab all you want, but reality is simply too complicated to get it right the first time. Gotta break some eggs and all that. Don't be so hard on yourself!
I'd like you both to simultaneously launch your solar planes and see which reaches the others house first, I feel like it could be a few episodes away... or a few years maybe
It’s a misconception that, due to the lack of tail surfaces, a flying wing has less drag than a conventional aeroplane. The nose down pitching moment caused by the wing camber has to be countered somehow in all aeroplanes and due to the relatively short moment arm over which the countering force can be applied on a flying wing, the induced drag is proportionally higher. If you want to see what an aircraft designed for maximum efficiency and low drag looks like, take a look at a competition sailplane. I really enjoy your videos and wholly approve of the recent addition of your lovely assistant. You’re inspiring the next generation of engineers and inventors, keep up the great work.
Yeah compare with gliders like the German Eta glider/sailplane, most human powered aircraft, and commerically produced solar aircraft - they pretty much all have a conventional tailplane. If tails were really inefficient, soaring birds wouldn't have them... Just copy nature - it already has billions of years of optimisation built in :)
@TheUberdude187 do you mean that by the fact he mentions "we only have a few days of sunny weather" Or the fact that uk generated 14twh, and that was 4% of the UKs usage. Either way. The uk does not have alot of solar energy.
@@bigvideoenergy "Or the fact that uk generated 14twh, and that was 4% of the UKs usage" - that's actually not bad, considering that everywhere you look in the UK, there aren't any solar panels... You're right that we get a lot less solar energy than, well, pretty much anywhere to the south of us... we do get a reasonable amount in summer (4.74kWh/sqm per day in London is quoted). And feckall in Winter (0.52kWh over the same area & time). I don't think the power usage of this plane was mentioned in the video, we'd need that to be able to do a theoretical calculation of how long it could fly for, and where.
I think you used common ground. The MPPT switches with ground so when you use the negative as a common the panels would never stop charging and bypass the MPPT. I think this will solve your charging problem. Keep up the good work its awesome to see😊
Really exciting to watch you start a Solar Powered RC Airplane! Love it. RCTestFlight had a similar overcharging issue with the same Genasun GV-5 Charger > The Charge-Cut-Off feature of the charger to the battery is done with the Ground Connection (instead of positive connection) and only works if it's directly connected to the battery ( seperated from FC, Power Meters, etc) Otherwise, it'll still charge the battery through an "indirect" connection to the ground wire of the battery and overcharge it. He explains it clearly in his "Solar Plane V4 Cross-Country Waypoint Mission" video at 6:37 Patiently waiting on Mk.II !
This is awesome. Solar power is amazing, but yes, you should always have batteries for everything in case the solar loses power. You can still fly and operate the electronics for a short time and avoid an expensive accident. Love you modeling DIY projects.
To any DIY person reading this, be careful when handling solar cells in arrays while unloaded ( not connected to any controller or load) , they can build up a fairly high (unloaded) voltage that can give you quite the zap if you close the circuit with your body ! Obviously tiny current but also, feels like a couple 1000 volts , similar to a static shock . It can pinch is all i'm saying
yep! electrician here.. we treat solarpanels as live when working with them.. as in we need special gloves etc. when connecting em.. offcourse a bit bigger panels than this..
One cell gives under optimal temperature conditions an open circuit voltage of 0,7V, you have to connect a few (>300) before it becomes lethal. That happens on domestic PV arrays but not here
That's good advice. Most people (including myself!) would never consider that because you always expect solar cells to be pretty weak. But when you start connecting them in series, and like you said unloaded, then maybe things can be different.
A word of advice for Arduplane. For planes you don't need compass at all (it will drift and only generate heading errors and AHRS miscalculations.) AP algorithm calculates heading best based on IMU and GPS coordinates. Turn off for the next projects. Also add good caps on the ESC and servos to clear up the noise.
Sounds like an integration problem. For example, both a gyroscope and accelerometer give erroneous data when used individually. IMU packages integrate the two sensors so that they correct each other to provide pretty reasonable data.
@@Shocker99 It's not integration problem man. AHRS generates errors looking at the compass because of the magnetic fields generated by the motors, esc and other components. IMU (acm + gs) + gps is sufficient because planes has pointy side and arduplane knows that.
@@sakarrc5001 If you keep the gps/compass module at least 10-20cm away there is little to no noise, unless you're running noisy components or kw's of power.
Oh no, sorry for your loss. Having built myself a similar but smaller solar plane and even built my own mppt controller, flightcontroller etc., happy to help you out whenever you have a question or need assistance. One thing, make sure the winglets do not cover your solar cells at any time as your output will be as low as the lowest cell is generating in your serial cell configuration. Regards, Chris
Great video, I admire your efforts. As former Aircrew and an RC enthusiast, I recommend a preflight and takeoff checklist to ensure items deemed essential are checked as on/tested/working. It helps a avoid a lot of errors 🤩
This is absolutely inspiring. My nephew watches your videos with me when he's over. His enthusiasm and fascination are palpable. Because of you, he has such a huge interest in RC vehicles, AI, and engineering.
From Arizona USA here I think you did a great job for what you have to work with. Very lightweight and more sunshine and would be a great addition. Carbon fiber fuselage with carbon fiber wing spars and struts covered by clear covering film and having the solar panels inside the wing may reduce drag and protect them. That’s a quiet expense idea though. Good video👍🇺🇸
2 місяці тому+39
because building a purely solar powered plane isn't hard enough, you do it in Britain... that's the spirit!
@Project-Air maybe another collab' with Tom Stanton ? His last magnetic rail-gun airplane catapult would fit right in with your solar airplane project ! We're rooting for you anyway ! Keep up the great work.
Back in the day when I used to fly "real" gliders [as in actually inside them as full-sized aircraft], we launched using a big high-speed drum winch that was V8 powered. I'd build something similar for this, just make it electric and run a spool of 2 or 3mm stainless steel wire rope. It'll haul all your aircraft into the sky and you can vary the speed as needed.
Don't do it. The 3DExperience platform that it runs on is the biggest piece of broken garbage I've ever used. I used SolidWorks professionally for years and loved the software. I tried the makers version just to check it out. It was so bad that I will no longer recommend anything from Dassault. This isn't just me. Check out some reviews.
Same! $48/year is actually surprisingly affordable, given the power of Solidworks. The only gotcha I can see, is if you do come up with a successful design & exceed the profit limitation (which is fine, because then the profit pays for the full version of the software), you can't transfer the design into the commercial product... i.e. you'd have to re-draw it from scratch, or import the STL (which loses all the parametric info). Other than that, I see no real downside. I shall certainly be taking them up on the offer! For the avoidance of doubt: I've no affiliation whatsoever with Solidworks, Dassault, or this channel. Just a happy user of an older version of SW.
Despite the loss of the aircraft, the fact that it did fly so well says to me that you're on the right track. If you had patiently waited a week or two for the weather to improve and didn't rush into flying it, you might have found the receiver battery was not connected. (edited: Next time, use a checklist) Also, waiting for the sun is a good idea for next time. Solar power implies that direct sunshine is required. Despite everything, I'd call this one a success. Congrats.
As someone who actually works on these large scale HAPSs it's fun to see hobbyists run into some of the same problems we've discovered and how ya'll mitigate.
That is a fantastic project! Congrats on getting it flying. We learned last year on one of our world record attempts that a checklist is necessary part of any important project. Looking forward to your next project. Keep up the great work.
I've frequently seen the argument for flying wings that "no tail = less drag". That's not necessarily true. Yes, the fuselage is smaller so the fuselage parasite drag decreases. However, the trim drag (lift induced drag caused by having to have downforce on the aft end of the aircraft to keep it balanced in flight) generally increases (this depends on CG location) and the parasite drag of the flying surfaces generally increases. Trim drag increases because by removing the tail you are reducing the moment arm upon which the downforce acts, therefore the downforce needs to be larger, and therefore the trim drag is larger. The flying surface parasite drag increases because the area used to generate that downforce is being moved from the tail to the wing, and that area usually needs to increase. In general, a flying wing usually has about the same drag or slightly higher drag than a conventional aircraft of the same weight. If you look at sailplane designs, where efficiency is absolutely critical, there are very few flying wing designs. People will occasionally try designing and building one, but they aren't efficient enough to be competitive against sailplanes of conventional configuration. The aileron problem you are experiencing here is likely the result of the wing being so flexible in torsion. For example, when the aileron tries to push one wing down, it is applying that force on the trailing edge of the wing. That downwards force then causes the wing to twist trailing edge down and leading edge up, which increases the local angle of attack and increases lift. In your aircraft the downwards force of the aileron and upwards force caused by twisting the wing largely cancel each other out, resulting in only a small net rolling moment. This effect is called aileron reversal. (At higher speeds the lift produced by twisting will exceed the downforce from the aileron, and the aileron controls will appear reversed, hence the name.)
How about adding an Ultra-capacitor based UPS to ride out the loss of drive whilst the wing faces away from the sun. It could also help during takeoff. The other benefit is that the ultra-capacitors also have effectively unlimited charge-discharge cycles.
This is why during my training for commercial RPAS we always emphasize the importance of SOP and a checklist: To prevent dumb mistakes as much as possible.
In the heart of dreams, where engines hum, James builds wonders, where few dare come. With cardboard, balsa, and LEGO he soared, A young inventor, curiosity roared. From planes to jets, with lightning speed, Pushing the limits, a world to lead. Through wind and rain, his RC car flew, A Guinness record, he blew! With passion, grit, and courage unbound, No challenge too steep, no goal too profound. Breaking barriers, James takes flight, In Project Air’s ever-glowing light. So here's to the builder who dares to defy, Reaching for stars, touching the sky. In every project, big or small, James reminds us: Dream, build, and stand tall.
1:56 Extremely wrong but right analogy 😂 Almost nothing here is correct, but it gets the point accross so it's a good enough vulgarisation. My respects to you for condensing a topic so complex down into less than 60 seconds
Couple of small suggestions and one question. You identified the need to separate the motor power from radio power - I would suggest using two LiFe cells (not LiPOs) for the radio to give you 6.6 V in series and more robust in charging. Think carefully about adverse yaw with a low speed wing - possibly bring the ailerons inboard (like flaps) to help with the adverse yaw moment. You state a weight of 3kg, area of 2000 cm^2 and a WCL of 1.06 at minute 6:36. Surely your area is way out ( 2 m^2 gives a WCL of 1.06). A wonderful flight and I wish you the best of everything in your future efforts - looking forward to your next video. Great job - very inspiring!
You learned some of the most important flying and engineering lessons here. Make a plan and use checklists. And perhaps most importantly, when you feel like you need to rush, take a quick step back and make sure you’re executing the plan. Don’t ask me how I’ve learned these lessons… Sometimes more than once. 😁 Love the enthusiasm! Keep up the good videos.
Enjoyed your video. I built model planes throughout my youth, only stopping when I enlisted in the USAF in 1964. I use to take a lot of ribbing from my High School buddies about “still playing with toys in HS”. I am homebound and get a lot an enjoyment watching videos, especially of model airplanes. For anyone that thinks flying RC planes is kid stuff, I would call their attention to the AC of my B-52. He was a Lt Colonel whi flew B-17’s in WW2, he would fly his RC plane in base right outside the mole hole where crews stood alert! No one said he was still a boy playing with toys. Keep up the videos.
I suspect you've used the wrong Genasun MPPT charge controller. If you're using it, the load output on the GV5 is only 5A. Power for your motor MUST come directly from a battery. The controller only charges the battery. The motor gets its power from the battery. This prevents dips in voltage, making up for clouds, dhadows, ... The GV5 shown in your video is for a 14.2 4S LiFePO4 battery, with nominal voltage of 12.8v. Moreover, it can only handle a maximum of 27 volts on the solar input. This means that the series/parallel solar panel configuration must not exceed 27 volts or 5 amps draw. The charge controller must match the battery chemistry and voltage used to power the motor and electronics. Hope this helps from Julian in Finland ( @oh8stn the other me )
Concerning the failure of the aircraft at the end and discovering the cause, always remember Mr. Checklist is your friend. Good luck on the next build. 👍
What a neat project. So many setbacks but you keep figuring them out. Good show!! When learning to fly I kept a garbage bag in my flying kit. Some guys joked about putting one right into the plane. Here is hoping you don't need any garbage bags going forward.
As a programmer, I clicked on this video even though it wasn't relevant to what I do. But to my surprise, the beauty of engineering and problem solving is apparent no matter what you do. Things like the compass being too close to the electricity, which caused the compass to malfunction. The little mistakes like that where one little thing messes up the entire procedure, you see that a lot in programming as well. Things like creating separate and smaller iterations for a design before putting them all together is also a method I do in programming, when I create a separate script to test something and make sure it's working before putting it into the main script. So yeah, I really think this was a great video. I know it's youtube and all, but I'd just really like it if you put in more detail in the math behind your plane design and just other little things you had to deal with.
Where is your emergency parachute? Also, you need a prelaunch checklist. Main battery installed and charged? Check. Controller batter installed and charged? Check. Emergency parachute armed? Check. etc. etc. etc. Then launch.
I really appreciate your efforts and the way you explained the failures and how you overcome those challenges. I enjoyed watching this video with my son. Really inspiring. Keep it up 🙏
Great start to a nice Solar Plane series. The benefit of extra testing is all the additional learnings! Would suggest making a design/preflight checklist to ensure all critical systems and features are present and functioning. Even though its a model plane, all the engineering and hard lessons are real. Looking forward to seeing the next @ProjectAir solar design take flight, based on your learnings so far.
YOU should make a high speed winch with a remote quick release so you could drag it along the grass and when you rotate you release. I don't know if this would definitely work but it has a dam good chance. Love the work pal.
Please don't see this as a failure but as a success. We have all learned much from it, and I believe you have too. I strongly believe the next one will be able to fly much higher and for a longer duration. Congrats👏👏👏👏👏👏
Maybe you should add a landing gear to protect the plane solar panels. You also should make a checklist just in case you forgot something and the checklist will remind you. Keep up the good work.
love your videos! one thing you should do different is to push the plane slightly downwards when launching so it accumulates speed. That is the right way to launch a rc plane.
Well done to get to the point you have, it is always fascinating watching what you come up with, how you explain it and test it, without failure how do you learn and improve and I'm sure you will brilliantly Tony from Western Australia 🇦🇺
Solar power also comes in the form of thermals. You could use the solar cells to reach the thermals and use the thermals to reach cloud base. This technique could help keep the plane up much longer and still keeps the project "solar power".
Awesome. Well done. Nice. Yes true. Correct. You have to look for the mono crystalline half cut cells. They will prevent or reduce the voltage drop that happens due to shadows.
Despite the failure I do think you are on the right way. The way the plane is build it is gliding like a buzzard. Keep on with it and make a pre-flight checklist!
There´s ways to program the failsafe to lock the attitude of the plane in any position. When I was in college we desinged, build and programmed an UAVfrom scratch. The mission was to take off, then do a waypoint mission to finally bring it back and land it (if it crashed it means you failed the subject😅). A small back up battery could work but from the weight perspective, lighter is always better, but imo programming the failsafe to lock attitude and maybe bring it down slowly in a loiter or program a return to home. This project was cool dude!
Pre-flight checklists are a thing for a reason. You might want to try to find low light cells. There have been some recent advancements in low light efficiency cells and some are flexible as well. Cool project, good luck.
Hey Project-Air, have you considered laminating the solar panels, or laying clear resin on the exposed surface of the solar panel to add some extra damage resistance, and also decrease drag a negligible amount as a bonus
I worked on the Aerovironment Helios aircraft. The company I worked for developed the low pressure Oxygen and Hydrogen storage tanks. The excess power generated by the solar panels during the day would split water via electrolysis and pump the two gasses into the storage tanks. At sunset, the gasses would be pumped into a fuel cell to produce electricity during the night. The system collected the resulting water to reprocess it into gasses during the next day
I have a stack of these exact solar cells sitting in my basement with the idea of embarking on a project just like this. So encouraging to see that it's possible!!! Just subscribed, can't wait to see how this progresses!!! Aren't those cells beautiful?
I can recommend that you set up a check list of things that are critical or have to be done before launch. If you set up a list then youll propably wont forget to plug in reserve battery or something. It is of course not a ful list as you can forget something but when you will go throught the list maybe something will pop up additionally. Im waiting for the next video! Cheers!
for Mk II, have a charging circuit for the "controller battery" that pulls power from the "motor battery", that way you can guarantee that you'll have close to a full charge if anything were to go wrong and you were to lose thrust/have to bring it in for a manual landing.
Really really like this program, hope it goes far, up. Like gain enough altitude to glide overnight. Cool. Suggestion, get the cels in the wing under clear wrap, to maintain laminar flow. Benefits will be immense. But you know better than me. Congrats on immensity successful,start.
We went from zero solar experience to... less than zero! Can't wait to start on the Solar 3 for the next video. 😎☀
That's good
You can learn anything in like 2 months lmao
this is sooooo cool my man
what is up dude. are you considering angle of attack compared to the sun while flying and establishing a route based on that? it also looked sort of gloomy out there.
Keep up the good work bro I love your vids
Honestly it always makes me feel normal and human when I see people make the same kinds of mistakes on projects that I know I would make. “Did you put the very sensitive gps right next to the powerful spinning electromagnet” definitely sounds like something I would do without even realizing.
Yeah well, you can try and think of any conceivable problem in your lab all you want, but reality is simply too complicated to get it right the first time. Gotta break some eggs and all that. Don't be so hard on yourself!
The other make you feel robot?
Being real and human, showing successes and failures is what both Project Air and I try to do.
I don't even do anything so good on you for tryinf
@@paranaenselol or are we dancer?
It flew so majestically! Can't wait to see version 2
Approval from the man himself.
Keep it up.
I'd love to see more solar projects from @rctestflight (boat or airplane) :) :)
Yaa this my dream to make solar glider plane
I'd like you both to simultaneously launch your solar planes and see which reaches the others house first, I feel like it could be a few episodes away... or a few years maybe
18:30 bro was trying to not cry
Remember *everyone makes mistake*
I'm surprised it managed to fly in the UK weather! Great job!
Should have built a rain powered plane; rookie mistake
Same
@@eelcohoogendoorn8044😂😂😂
@@eelcohoogendoorn8044 lol
Go to a dessert that thing could fly forever
It’s a misconception that, due to the lack of tail surfaces, a flying wing has less drag than a conventional aeroplane. The nose down pitching moment caused by the wing camber has to be countered somehow in all aeroplanes and due to the relatively short moment arm over which the countering force can be applied on a flying wing, the induced drag is proportionally higher.
If you want to see what an aircraft designed for maximum efficiency and low drag looks like, take a look at a competition sailplane.
I really enjoy your videos and wholly approve of the recent addition of your lovely assistant. You’re inspiring the next generation of engineers and inventors, keep up the great work.
100% correct 👍
YEP!
Yeah compare with gliders like the German Eta glider/sailplane, most human powered aircraft, and commerically produced solar aircraft - they pretty much all have a conventional tailplane. If tails were really inefficient, soaring birds wouldn't have them... Just copy nature - it already has billions of years of optimisation built in :)
Swept wings also increase tip vortices
Yeah, low speed efficiency is gained by long low aspect ratio wings and body smoothness
Doing this in the UK is a mission on its own
If only there was weight efficient way to capture rain power.
It's really not. We actually get a lot of solar energy in the uk
@TheUberdude187 do you mean that by the fact he mentions "we only have a few days of sunny weather"
Or the fact that uk generated 14twh, and that was 4% of the UKs usage.
Either way. The uk does not have alot of solar energy.
@@bigvideoenergy "Or the fact that uk generated 14twh, and that was 4% of the UKs usage" - that's actually not bad, considering that everywhere you look in the UK, there aren't any solar panels...
You're right that we get a lot less solar energy than, well, pretty much anywhere to the south of us... we do get a reasonable amount in summer (4.74kWh/sqm per day in London is quoted). And feckall in Winter (0.52kWh over the same area & time). I don't think the power usage of this plane was mentioned in the video, we'd need that to be able to do a theoretical calculation of how long it could fly for, and where.
I think you used common ground.
The MPPT switches with ground so when you use the negative as a common the panels would never stop charging and bypass the MPPT. I think this will solve your charging problem.
Keep up the good work its awesome to see😊
Really exciting to watch you start a Solar Powered RC Airplane! Love it.
RCTestFlight had a similar overcharging issue with the same Genasun GV-5 Charger > The Charge-Cut-Off feature of the charger to the battery is done with the Ground Connection (instead of positive connection) and only works if it's directly connected to the battery ( seperated from FC, Power Meters, etc) Otherwise, it'll still charge the battery through an "indirect" connection to the ground wire of the battery and overcharge it.
He explains it clearly in his "Solar Plane V4 Cross-Country Waypoint Mission" video at 6:37
Patiently waiting on Mk.II !
What a chad comment! This guy just casually sees a problem and drops an explanation video with a time stamp. Legend.
Anyone designing a solar plane and researched it properly should already have seen this!
Hii I love your videos and i you subscriber
This is awesome. Solar power is amazing, but yes, you should always have batteries for everything in case the solar loses power. You can still fly and operate the electronics for a short time and avoid an expensive accident.
Love you modeling DIY projects.
To any DIY person reading this, be careful when handling solar cells in arrays while unloaded ( not connected to any controller or load) , they can build up a fairly high (unloaded) voltage that can give you quite the zap if you close the circuit with your body ! Obviously tiny current but also, feels like a couple 1000 volts , similar to a static shock . It can pinch is all i'm saying
When you don't understand voltage and amperage you think solar panels are dangerous. Got to start making accounts and spamming
It's amazing how small a current is needed to kill you if it passes through your ticker for long enough.
yep! electrician here.. we treat solarpanels as live when working with them.. as in we need special gloves etc. when connecting em.. offcourse a bit bigger panels than this..
One cell gives under optimal temperature conditions an open circuit voltage of 0,7V, you have to connect a few (>300) before it becomes lethal. That happens on domestic PV arrays but not here
That's good advice. Most people (including myself!) would never consider that because you always expect solar cells to be pretty weak. But when you start connecting them in series, and like you said unloaded, then maybe things can be different.
Glad to see Solidworks provide a 'maker' offering. It's the first CAD I used, the one I know best, and I've been dreading my student license expiring.
Makes me wonder if signing on for a further course of study might be cheaper than paying full license fee 😁
A word of advice for Arduplane.
For planes you don't need compass at all (it will drift and only generate heading errors and AHRS miscalculations.) AP algorithm calculates heading best based on IMU and GPS coordinates. Turn off for the next projects. Also add good caps on the ESC and servos to clear up the noise.
Sounds like an integration problem.
For example, both a gyroscope and accelerometer give erroneous data when used individually. IMU packages integrate the two sensors so that they correct each other to provide pretty reasonable data.
@@Shocker99 It's not integration problem man. AHRS generates errors looking at the compass because of the magnetic fields generated by the motors, esc and other components. IMU (acm + gs) + gps is sufficient because planes has pointy side and arduplane knows that.
@@sakarrc5001 If you keep the gps/compass module at least 10-20cm away there is little to no noise, unless you're running noisy components or kw's of power.
@@thirtythreeeyes8624 OK!
@@sakarrc5001 You've described an integration problem.
10:21 When testing a plane design without solar panels, it’s important to add a dummy load to simulate the weight of the missing panels.
Oh no, sorry for your loss.
Having built myself a similar but smaller solar plane and even built my own mppt controller, flightcontroller etc., happy to help you out whenever you have a question or need assistance.
One thing, make sure the winglets do not cover your solar cells at any time as your output will be as low as the lowest cell is generating in your serial cell configuration.
Regards, Chris
Seeing the onboard footage of the plane just giving up and diving nose-first into the ground is giving me chills. In a scary way.
Great video, I admire your efforts. As former Aircrew and an RC enthusiast, I recommend a preflight and takeoff checklist to ensure items deemed essential are checked as on/tested/working. It helps a avoid a lot of errors 🤩
This is absolutely inspiring. My nephew watches your videos with me when he's over. His enthusiasm and fascination are palpable.
Because of you, he has such a huge interest in RC vehicles, AI, and engineering.
From Arizona USA here I think you did a great job for what you have to work with. Very lightweight and more sunshine and would be a great addition. Carbon fiber fuselage with carbon fiber wing spars and struts covered by clear covering film and having the solar panels inside the wing may reduce drag and protect them. That’s a quiet expense idea though. Good video👍🇺🇸
because building a purely solar powered plane isn't hard enough, you do it in Britain... that's the spirit!
13:22 You could say the plane is flying a... Painless 360º
for the next project, try making a launch system to make launching these larger planes easier
@Project-Air maybe another collab' with Tom Stanton ? His last magnetic rail-gun airplane catapult would fit right in with your solar airplane project !
We're rooting for you anyway ! Keep up the great work.
I agree with this. The hand launches are very anxiety inducing considering how big the planes are getting
Back in the day when I used to fly "real" gliders [as in actually inside them as full-sized aircraft], we launched using a big high-speed drum winch that was V8 powered.
I'd build something similar for this, just make it electric and run a spool of 2 or 3mm stainless steel wire rope.
It'll haul all your aircraft into the sky and you can vary the speed as needed.
@@vincentdesjardins1354Yes, definitely! That's a good point! His project would fit in perfectly with this!
you need a pre-launch checklist
i think this is what they do at places like NASA
to avoid forgetting stuff
I'll be honest I usually skip the ad spots, but this one was actually something I've been hoping for. Interesting to see from Solidworks!
Don't do it. The 3DExperience platform that it runs on is the biggest piece of broken garbage I've ever used. I used SolidWorks professionally for years and loved the software. I tried the makers version just to check it out. It was so bad that I will no longer recommend anything from Dassault. This isn't just me. Check out some reviews.
When he mentioned the mistake due to fatigue I was fully expecting an advert for coffee!
Cloud-based for non-windows users? Looks like they’re targeting OnShape.
Don't fool yourself, it's still the hot garbage shit it has always been.
Same! $48/year is actually surprisingly affordable, given the power of Solidworks. The only gotcha I can see, is if you do come up with a successful design & exceed the profit limitation (which is fine, because then the profit pays for the full version of the software), you can't transfer the design into the commercial product... i.e. you'd have to re-draw it from scratch, or import the STL (which loses all the parametric info). Other than that, I see no real downside. I shall certainly be taking them up on the offer!
For the avoidance of doubt: I've no affiliation whatsoever with Solidworks, Dassault, or this channel. Just a happy user of an older version of SW.
Despite the loss of the aircraft, the fact that it did fly so well says to me that you're on the right track. If you had patiently waited a week or two for the weather to improve and didn't rush into flying it, you might have found the receiver battery was not connected. (edited: Next time, use a checklist)
Also, waiting for the sun is a good idea for next time. Solar power implies that direct sunshine is required.
Despite everything, I'd call this one a success. Congrats.
As someone who actually works on these large scale HAPSs it's fun to see hobbyists run into some of the same problems we've discovered and how ya'll mitigate.
Suggestion: put some transparent foil laminated on top of the solar cells. Making the wing smoother could improve efficiency
That also reduces pv efficiency
Maybe just recess them into the wing.
Infinite power. Well done flying in that poor sunlight it did a great job 👍
Let’s hope we get more sun soon! 😅
That is a fantastic project! Congrats on getting it flying. We learned last year on one of our world record attempts that a checklist is necessary part of any important project.
Looking forward to your next project. Keep up the great work.
I’ve seen this done before by rc test flight but it’s stilll really cool to see you do it too!
I wish there were more numbers in terms of costs, so other people can assess if they can tackle such interesting projects themselves.
Glad you're not giving up. Only way this marvel is going to take to the skies and stay there is if you keep at it! Good luck sir. I love your videos!
when you notice the power dropping, you don't pull the nose up and stall.... you drop the nose and glide. RIP first plane @ 6:05 ish
Have just been rewatching rctestflights videos of his solar planes - looks like a really cool series for you!
I've always been a fan of those videos!
20:54 this is why checklists are existing
are *a thing.
or
*exist.
16:10 flying
Good video! Use a separate battery for the receiver so you can dead stick it back. The walk of shame is real!
20:37
they were using it but they forgot to put it
Could even charge the receiver battery through a diode or other 1-way switch from the main battery for longer flights
Fun build! Those solar cells are really cool
Wouldnt be a ProjectAir video without a terrible crash😂😂 18:54
Just part of the hobby. Glad he does show every aspect.
I've frequently seen the argument for flying wings that "no tail = less drag". That's not necessarily true. Yes, the fuselage is smaller so the fuselage parasite drag decreases. However, the trim drag (lift induced drag caused by having to have downforce on the aft end of the aircraft to keep it balanced in flight) generally increases (this depends on CG location) and the parasite drag of the flying surfaces generally increases. Trim drag increases because by removing the tail you are reducing the moment arm upon which the downforce acts, therefore the downforce needs to be larger, and therefore the trim drag is larger. The flying surface parasite drag increases because the area used to generate that downforce is being moved from the tail to the wing, and that area usually needs to increase. In general, a flying wing usually has about the same drag or slightly higher drag than a conventional aircraft of the same weight.
If you look at sailplane designs, where efficiency is absolutely critical, there are very few flying wing designs. People will occasionally try designing and building one, but they aren't efficient enough to be competitive against sailplanes of conventional configuration.
The aileron problem you are experiencing here is likely the result of the wing being so flexible in torsion. For example, when the aileron tries to push one wing down, it is applying that force on the trailing edge of the wing. That downwards force then causes the wing to twist trailing edge down and leading edge up, which increases the local angle of attack and increases lift. In your aircraft the downwards force of the aileron and upwards force caused by twisting the wing largely cancel each other out, resulting in only a small net rolling moment. This effect is called aileron reversal. (At higher speeds the lift produced by twisting will exceed the downforce from the aileron, and the aileron controls will appear reversed, hence the name.)
Without doubt one of your best ever videos. Solar powered and autopilot, amazing.
Bro giving me a lecture instead of getting straight to the point. Another professional yapper👏👏
A tail-mounted parachute may be ideal for delicate builds like this.
How about adding an Ultra-capacitor based UPS to ride out the loss of drive whilst the wing faces away from the sun. It could also help during takeoff.
The other benefit is that the ultra-capacitors also have effectively unlimited charge-discharge cycles.
Yesss I always love these solar plane projects, please continue!
This is why during my training for commercial RPAS we always emphasize the importance of SOP and a checklist: To prevent dumb mistakes as much as possible.
You could let us know where you bought those solar cells.
It's made by a private factory so, he can't tell...
What a cool project!
Write and follow flight checklist! Fatigue can make anyone feel stupid. Looking forward to the next build!
In the heart of dreams, where engines hum,
James builds wonders, where few dare come.
With cardboard, balsa, and LEGO he soared,
A young inventor, curiosity roared.
From planes to jets, with lightning speed,
Pushing the limits, a world to lead.
Through wind and rain, his RC car flew,
A Guinness record, he blew!
With passion, grit, and courage unbound,
No challenge too steep, no goal too profound.
Breaking barriers, James takes flight,
In Project Air’s ever-glowing light.
So here's to the builder who dares to defy,
Reaching for stars, touching the sky.
In every project, big or small,
James reminds us: Dream, build, and stand tall.
I love how when you lost controll, it was like a movie. The laptop just said "Telemetry lost" i think. So cinematic.
"Sink rate...sink rate...pull up"
@@ct6502-c7w also "Terrain... pull up"
"Love seeing creators who make videos for the passion, not just the views or money. It really shows in their content!
ProjectAir in 2050: "So today we will be building and launching the Arsenal Bird"
Im glad im not the only one seeing the Arsenal bird😂
@@wilmerfa2734 my brain after playing AC7: "What is that? Is that a flying wing?"
Me: "yes"
My brain: "So that's an Arsenal Bird"
(full scale including drones and belkan magic forcefield)
Oh yeah fully fleshing this out in a second version would go very hard.
1:56
Extremely wrong but right analogy 😂
Almost nothing here is correct, but it gets the point accross so it's a good enough vulgarisation.
My respects to you for condensing a topic so complex down into less than 60 seconds
9:09 ha ha ha... Mark Rober toy in the back round is just silly. Love the vids
What a phenomenally British reaction to an expensive disaster 😂 bloody good stuff
Couple of small suggestions and one question. You identified the need to separate the motor power from radio power - I would suggest using two LiFe cells (not LiPOs) for the radio to give you 6.6 V in series and more robust in charging.
Think carefully about adverse yaw with a low speed wing - possibly bring the ailerons inboard (like flaps) to help with the adverse yaw moment.
You state a weight of 3kg, area of 2000 cm^2 and a WCL of 1.06 at minute 6:36. Surely your area is way out ( 2 m^2 gives a WCL of 1.06).
A wonderful flight and I wish you the best of everything in your future efforts - looking forward to your next video. Great job - very inspiring!
The music at ~7:30 makes it really hard to understand you. At least for me, maybe others can tune out the music better, but for me it's just noise.
Hahahaha came here to say the exact same thing 😅
Frr
You learned some of the most important flying and engineering lessons here. Make a plan and use checklists. And perhaps most importantly, when you feel like you need to rush, take a quick step back and make sure you’re executing the plan. Don’t ask me how I’ve learned these lessons… Sometimes more than once. 😁 Love the enthusiasm! Keep up the good videos.
What a bueutiful shot 16:47
Enjoyed your video. I built model planes throughout my youth, only stopping when I enlisted in the USAF in 1964. I use to take a lot of ribbing from my High School buddies about “still playing with toys in HS”.
I am homebound and get a lot an enjoyment watching videos, especially of model airplanes.
For anyone that thinks flying RC planes is kid stuff, I would call their attention to the AC of my B-52. He was a Lt Colonel whi flew B-17’s in WW2, he would fly his RC plane in base right outside the mole hole where crews stood alert! No one said he was still a boy playing with toys. Keep up the videos.
I suspect you've used the wrong Genasun MPPT charge controller. If you're using it, the load output on the GV5 is only 5A. Power for your motor MUST come directly from a battery. The controller only charges the battery. The motor gets its power from the battery. This prevents dips in voltage, making up for clouds, dhadows, ...
The GV5 shown in your video is for a 14.2 4S LiFePO4 battery, with nominal voltage of 12.8v. Moreover, it can only handle a maximum of 27 volts on the solar input. This means that the series/parallel solar panel configuration must not exceed 27 volts or 5 amps draw.
The charge controller must match the battery chemistry and voltage used to power the motor and electronics.
Hope this helps from Julian in Finland ( @oh8stn the other me )
Concerning the failure of the aircraft at the end and discovering the cause, always remember Mr. Checklist is your friend. Good luck on the next build. 👍
What a neat project. So many setbacks but you keep figuring them out. Good show!! When learning to fly I kept a garbage bag in my flying kit. Some guys joked about putting one right into the plane. Here is hoping you don't need any garbage bags going forward.
make an arsenal bird
Nicely done! This project really shows how aircraft design is an exercise in compromise and optimization. Looking forward to part 2.
As a programmer, I clicked on this video even though it wasn't relevant to what I do. But to my surprise, the beauty of engineering and problem solving is apparent no matter what you do. Things like the compass being too close to the electricity, which caused the compass to malfunction. The little mistakes like that where one little thing messes up the entire procedure, you see that a lot in programming as well. Things like creating separate and smaller iterations for a design before putting them all together is also a method I do in programming, when I create a separate script to test something and make sure it's working before putting it into the main script. So yeah, I really think this was a great video. I know it's youtube and all, but I'd just really like it if you put in more detail in the math behind your plane design and just other little things you had to deal with.
Where is your emergency parachute? Also, you need a prelaunch checklist. Main battery installed and charged? Check. Controller batter installed and charged? Check. Emergency parachute armed? Check. etc. etc. etc. Then launch.
I was sorry to see it crash, looking forward to the next improved version!
I'd never been interested in RC planes until I started watching your videos. Great content, well presented. Thanks. 👍
I really appreciate your efforts and the way you explained the failures and how you overcome those challenges. I enjoyed watching this video with my son. Really inspiring. Keep it up 🙏
Great start to a nice Solar Plane series. The benefit of extra testing is all the additional learnings!
Would suggest making a design/preflight checklist to ensure all critical systems and features are present and functioning. Even though its a model plane, all the engineering and hard lessons are real. Looking forward to seeing the next @ProjectAir solar design take flight, based on your learnings so far.
YOU should make a high speed winch with a remote quick release so you could drag it along the grass and when you rotate you release. I don't know if this would definitely work but it has a dam good chance. Love the work pal.
Please don't see this as a failure but as a success. We have all learned much from it, and I believe you have too. I strongly believe the next one will be able to fly much higher and for a longer duration. Congrats👏👏👏👏👏👏
Love it please continue this project. A drone that can fly itself for days is a dream!
What an incredible project! I can definitely sympathise with your battle against the weather. Looking forward to V3!!!
Very good! I wish you all the best in finalizing your project
very nice! I recommend shielding the solar panels with something super solid and completely transparant
What a great creation. Well done! Love the video in terms of composition, content and format. Can’t wait for the next one!
good job - love the chin-up attitude through the iterative process!
You handled that way better than me . Did love seeing it up in that beautiful sky for a bit an thank god the panels missed that rock wall.
Maybe you should add a landing gear to protect the plane solar panels. You also should make a checklist just in case you forgot something and the checklist will remind you. Keep up the good work.
love your videos! one thing you should do different is to push the plane slightly downwards when launching so it accumulates speed. That is the right way to launch a rc plane.
Well done to get to the point you have, it is always fascinating watching what you come up with, how you explain it and test it, without failure how do you learn and improve and I'm sure you will brilliantly
Tony from Western Australia 🇦🇺
Solar power also comes in the form of thermals. You could use the solar cells to reach the thermals and use the thermals to reach cloud base. This technique could help keep the plane up much longer and still keeps the project "solar power".
Awesome. Well done. Nice. Yes true. Correct. You have to look for the mono crystalline half cut cells. They will prevent or reduce the voltage drop that happens due to shadows.
Despite the failure I do think you are on the right way. The way the plane is build it is gliding like a buzzard. Keep on with it and make a pre-flight checklist!
There´s ways to program the failsafe to lock the attitude of the plane in any position. When I was in college we desinged, build and programmed an UAVfrom scratch. The mission was to take off, then do a waypoint mission to finally bring it back and land it (if it crashed it means you failed the subject😅). A small back up battery could work but from the weight perspective, lighter is always better, but imo programming the failsafe to lock attitude and maybe bring it down slowly in a loiter or program a return to home. This project was cool dude!
Pre-flight checklists are a thing for a reason. You might want to try to find low light cells. There have been some recent advancements in low light efficiency cells and some are flexible as well. Cool project, good luck.
Hey Project-Air, have you considered laminating the solar panels, or laying clear resin on the exposed surface of the solar panel to add some extra damage resistance, and also decrease drag a negligible amount as a bonus
I worked on the Aerovironment Helios aircraft. The company I worked for developed the low pressure Oxygen and Hydrogen storage tanks. The excess power generated by the solar panels during the day would split water via electrolysis and pump the two gasses into the storage tanks. At sunset, the gasses would be pumped into a fuel cell to produce electricity during the night. The system collected the resulting water to reprocess it into gasses during the next day
I wish I could bring you and your solar craft to the sunny skies of Southern California. Super cool.
I have a stack of these exact solar cells sitting in my basement with the idea of embarking on a project just like this. So encouraging to see that it's possible!!! Just subscribed, can't wait to see how this progresses!!!
Aren't those cells beautiful?
I can recommend that you set up a check list of things that are critical or have to be done before launch. If you set up a list then youll propably wont forget to plug in reserve battery or something. It is of course not a ful list as you can forget something but when you will go throught the list maybe something will pop up additionally. Im waiting for the next video! Cheers!
for Mk II, have a charging circuit for the "controller battery" that pulls power from the "motor battery", that way you can guarantee that you'll have close to a full charge if anything were to go wrong and you were to lose thrust/have to bring it in for a manual landing.
You guys are shining your lights brightly.
Amazing work, no matter the outcome. Congratulations!
This was epic! Can't wait for more. I love solar and rc planes, thanks for the jard work.
Great Job on the plane /cheers from America.
Really really like this program, hope it goes far, up. Like gain enough altitude to glide overnight. Cool.
Suggestion, get the cels in the wing under clear wrap, to maintain laminar flow. Benefits will be immense.
But you know better than me.
Congrats on immensity successful,start.